Meg Haworth

          When you’re gluten and dairy free, you quickly learn that a simple, sinful, salty snack that has neither wheat nor dairy (well, usually doesn’t) is a big plate of French fries.  You also learn that it’s best not to eat them every day for risk of indigestion from fried food build up -- and obesity.  So, when I do eat fries, I find the best.             

           It’s critical to know that French fries in fast food joints and low end diners may have been dusted with wheat flour prior to landing in the fryer.  Another fry offense is fries that are actually made of powdered potato and gluten.  The powder is made from the unwanted parts of the potato, making these fries like the hotdogs of the potato world.    So always ask how the fries are prepared.  If they can't answer you, because they don't know, don’t eat them.   Stick to the more high-end places instead.  They will be happy to answer your questions and prepare things the way you like them.   

            Last week I had an unplanned French fry event at the Fairmont Hotel in Santa Monica.  My friend Andy Gerngross (screen writer extraordinaire) called to say he had hacked his hair off at a local salon.  He went from looking like Jesus to a corporate executive in less than half an hour.  I had to see him.

            We wandered the streets of Santa Monica looking for some place to hang our hats for a while and happened upon The Fairmont Hotel.  Beautiful place.  We sat by the pool, ordered wine and shrimp cocktail.  We wanted something more substantial and found it in truffle fries.  Mmmm!  Fresh cut potatoes fried to perfection and doused with truffle oil.  They were divine.  The mark of a great place, at least for the wheat and dairy free among us, is a food server who can tell you exactly how the food is prepared.  Our server, Will, described their preparation in perfect detail. 

            Three days later my roommate Moira Shepard and I took our friend Kelley Wright out to Finn McCool’s, a Santa Monica Irish pub with the best pub grub this side of the motherland herself.  Moira and I indulge at least once a quarter in the Sunday afternoon live Irish music and -- our number one reason for claiming ourselves as Irish -- the garlic fries with a pint or two of Guinness on draught. 

Whenever Moira and I order this oil soaked treat, we always ask for extra garlic.  Usually the waiter or waitress will look at us like we have two heads, “There’s already a ton of garlic on there.”  We have to plead, “You don’t understand.  There’s no such thing as too much garlic.”  This day, our handsome Irish waiter nodded in glorious understanding of our fanaticism and brought us not one, but two plates of this sinfully prepared night shade veggie.

Kelley had been to Finn’s before but had somehow managed to escape the fries.  Moira and I sat there, incredulous, when we discovered she was a garlic fry virgin.  When the plate arrived, Moira and I watched her with great anticipation as she bit into her first fry.  Her eyes closed in ecstasy as she savored her first bite.  After a long, sensual pause, she looked up at us and said; “It hurts so good.”  She was hooked.  She wondered how she had lived without this sublime combination of food and drink. 

Two plates, two Guinness, and a fabulous curried vegetable potato boxty (like a crepe) later, we were pleasantly full and very happily satisfied.       

That's Kelley, Moira and Meg

Now, we shall see whose garlic fry virginity we can sully next . . .

Had fries that are to die for?  Tell us about them here.  For more information about gluten and dairy free living, contact Doctor Meg at www.DeliciousAndHealthy.com